Typhoon Meranti (2016)

Typhoon Meranti (Ferdie)

Typhoon (JMA scale)
Category 5 (Saffir–Simpson scale)
Typhoon Meranti near peak intensity on September 13
Formed	September 8, 2016
Dissipated	September 17, 2016
(Extratropical after September 16)
Highest winds	10-minute sustained: 220 km/h (140 mph) 1-minute sustained: 305 km/h (190 mph)
Lowest pressure	890 hPa (mbar); 26.28 inHg
Fatalities	30 confirmed, 15 missing
Damage	$2.63 billion (2016 USD)
Areas affected	Philippines, Taiwan, China, Korean Peninsula
Part of the 2016 Pacific typhoon season

Typhoon Meranti, known in the Philippines as Typhoon Ferdie, was one of the most intense tropical cyclones on record, impacting the Batanes in the Philippines, Taiwan, as well as Fujian, China in September 2016. The fourteenth named storm of the annual typhoon season, Meranti was the strongest typhoon since Typhoon Megi in 2010 in terms of pressure, the strongest since Typhoon Haiyan of 2013 in terms of maximum sustained winds, as well as the strongest tropical cyclone worldwide in 2016.

On September 8, the Joint Typhoon Warning Center (JTWC) issued a Tropical Cyclone Formation Alert for an area of convection about 155 km (96 mi) west of Guam in the western Pacific Ocean. According to the agency, the circulation was rapidly consolidating alongside fragmented rainbands. At 18:00 UTC that night, the Japan Meteorological Agency (JMA) classified the system as a tropical depression. On the next day, the JTWC classified it as Tropical Depression 16W. By that time, the nascent system was moving slowly west-northwestward through a region of low wind shear, steered by ridges to the north and southwest. Increasing but fragmented convection, or thunderstorms, was fueled by unusually warm water temperatures and outflow from the south. At 06:00 UTC on September 10, the JMA upgraded the depression to Tropical Storm Meranti, which meandered over its own track while consolidating.